Permission to launch a small, imperfect product that’s not overly designed

[00:00:00] Rene: Hey everyone. Welcome to Your First Digital Product, a show that helps maxed-out service providers create their first digital product so they can gain an additional income stream, grow their impact without increasing one-on-one work and experience more time freedom. On the show, I talk to business owners who have launched digital products and dig deep into how you can create, launch, and market your first digital product. I’m your host, Rene Morozowich. Let’s go.

[00:00:28] Hey everyone. It’s Rene. I had a great conversation last week with someone who was thinking about launching a product, but had not launched for a couple reasons. I feel like these reasons are very common across people who have not launched products and it inspired today’s episode. So I want to talk about what your product needs to be, or doesn’t have to be in order to launch. So I have four reasons and four things to talk about today. The first thing that your product does not have to be is long and complicated.

[00:01:00] So I’ve said this before, but think back to when you first started as a service provider. I bet you didn’t take on the most complicated project of all time. You were just learning, you didn’t maybe know what you were doing yet. You probably had some skills, but you weren’t really versed in this type of service. So think about your digital product. Why would you start with something that is super long and complicated? You can draw parallels with this anywhere, right? So you can think about if you’ve never been running. Why would you run a marathon as your first race and maybe not a 5k? You can think about baking, you know, why would you bake something super complicated and not just cookies first or something like that. So whenever we’re thinking about these things, we don’t know what we don’t know. So I advocate for starting with something smaller. You can add on as you go, you can change things later, but starting with something [00:02:00] smaller will let you actually get it out the door so that you can learn the things that you don’t know. Also long and complicated products are too much for people to consume. Typically they don’t know you yet. People purchasing your product don’t know you. You haven’t had that introductory conversation, that 30 minute Zoom call or whatever it is for them to get to know like, and trust you. So all they’re going off of is the marketing and maybe having followed you on social media or your email list or things like that. So providing your first product as a super big, long and complicated product, I don’t think you’ll see the same success as if you gave them something smaller with a quick win. And then they will know that you can definitely help them with their problem and other problems going forward. So, it doesn’t have to be long and complicated.

[00:02:52] The second thing that your product does not have to be is overly designed and edited. Now yes, it should look nice. And yes, it should be clear, but don’t let the design hold you back from actually releasing something. There are definitely things that are much more important when thinking about your product than design. Launching. So launching is good. You can have the loveliest designed product in the world. If you haven’t launched it, no one is going to see that. Marketing your product, sharing it with other people. Again, you can have a lovely product that’s out there and super designed and wonderfully edited. If you’re not marketing and sharing it with people, no one is going to actually see that. Also, what is more important is identifying one problem and one clear solution. So giving something that is lovely and beautifully designed, but doesn’t actually solve a problem, is long and complicated, you’re not going to see the same success with it. Now I’ve purchased products in the past, and I bet you have too. And many of these have looked lovely, but there’s no correlation between the ones that are beautifully designed[00:04:00] and very lovely to look at and the ones that actually got me a result. So again, yes, it should look nice. And yes, it should be clear. But don’t let, having it be overly designed, be something that holds you back.

[00:04:13] The next thing that your product does not have to be is final and forever. Final and forever. And I’ve had guests on the show who have shared their story of talking about products that they have launched, that they have iterated on. They’ve simplified those over time. So as they learn more, if they can get their customers to a solution much more quickly, they do go back and they simplify that product. They’ve also talked about changing, based on feedback.

[00:04:42] So feedback that they’ve gotten from their audience, they can see where people are stuck or where people don’t understand or where people fall off. They’re changing that product. So the product that you’re putting out there is not the product that it’s going to be forever and for all time. I have a quick story about this, where I started working my first job out of college, and very quickly realized that it was not for me. And this was back in the early, early days of the Internet and I really wasn’t sure where to go or what to do. It wasn’t the same sort of like work at home, boot camps, that kind of thing. It really wasn’t that, that sort of situation. And I remember buying this course online and going through like this whole career change course. And it was really something new at the time. Like it really wasn’t something that had been offered. It wasn’t very common. And I got a card from a friend of mine and she was very supportive about this new path that I wanted to take even after just coming out of college and very quickly deciding, oh no, that’s not the right path for me. She said the next version of you, we will still love. And I think about that often, because even you, yourself, as a person, the version you are at 20, 25, 30, 35, these are different [00:06:00] versions. So thinking that product that you create is going to be final and forever is not something that you need to think. Think that it will change over time. And that will actually be good, I think, and better for you. Because then you won’t have all that pressure. I think about this when I talk with clients about design in their website. So if they launch a website, if they don’t like a photo, they can change that very quickly. It’s not like you ordered 10,000 brochures where if you don’t like that photo, you’re stuck with 10,000 brochures.

[00:06:27] So you can change these things over time based on feedback. Based on learning more about your craft and being able to provide a solution much more quickly.

[00:06:38] The last thing that your product does not have to be is perfect. Nothing that we do the first time or any time is perfect. And also what’s perfect for me is not necessarily what’s perfect for you, which is not necessarily what’s perfect for your audience. So my son is starting 10th grade in a couple of days. And I think back to my 11th grade trigonometry teacher. Her name was Mrs. Sterrett. I loved her. I loved her so much. I just, we just clicked. I love the way that she taught. I understood it. Everything was very clear and really just worked for me. But a lot of the kids in that class did not like her. It didn’t click for them. It didn’t work for them.

[00:07:18] So what’s perfect for me. Mrs. Sterrett was perfect in teaching trigonometry for me, was not perfect for other people. So you really do want to think about your audience and your definition of perfect. And if perfect is something you are really striving for, think about how to get to be perfect is to do it and keep doing it and keep getting better at it. So if you never launch that product and never launch another and never launch another, you’re not going to get better and better over time. So, the reason that I am talking about this today is because I want to normalize a real experience and the real experiences that people do have. There are so many [00:08:00] misconceptions that people have. Oh, it has to be perfect. Oh, it has to be super edited and super designed. Oh, it has to be the biggest product of all time.

[00:08:07] It doesn’t have to be any of these things. Sometimes when we see people who are so far ahead of us, we can feel intimidated. We can feel like, oh my goodness, they have the marketing going and they have the ads and everything, the funnels and everything is leading to everything else. And it’s amazing. And they’re making billions of dollars a year. And yes, that’s great and fine, but they started somewhere too. And if you don’t start at the beginning where you’re supposed to, you’re never going to get to that place. And maybe that place isn’t even really where you want to go. Maybe the only place you want to go is being able to support your family, having time for yourself and sharing your gifts and your knowledge and your experience with the world.

[00:08:47] So just think about those things. And sometimes we just need permission to be what we are and share what we have. So here’s your permission. I can write you a permission slip, just send me an email and I will give you one personalized for you. Your first product does not have to be long and complicated. It does not have to be overly designed and edited. It does not have to be final and forever and it does not have to be perfect. So get it out there. Get what you have in your heart and in your mind out there and share it with the world and get better over time. So, what do you think, are you not creating or launching because you’re stuck on one of these? Are you stuck in a certain area? Send me a voice message at yfdp.show/share or an email. I’d love to hear from you and talk about the problems that you are having.

[00:09:34] Hey, thanks for listening. I’d love to continue the conversation in your inbox. Email SUBSCRIBE to hey at yfdp.show or sign up in the show notes to get bimonthly emails about how you can create, launch, and market your first digital product. Can’t wait to see you there.